Hard punches
by Skyflame
Summary: Still working on the title.After having her life turned upside down Serena manages to find happiness with an old friend. Or does she? Life really packs hard punches sometimes.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer : I don't own Sailor Moon or any of its characters otherwise I wouldn't need to write as I would be drooling over Endy.

I always thought that some things in life would be easy. That I would have no problem finding the person I loved and was going to marry, and once we were together nothing would ever go wrong. I thought that everything would be sunshine, roses and happiness after I got engaged, but oh how wrong I was.

My name is Serenity Taylor, Serena for short, a fashion designer and this is my story.

"I can't believe hat this is happening. It is not at all fair." I grumbled to myself as I slammed down the phone aggravated that wasn't already on my way home. I sighed as I picked up the phone once again to advise my fiancée of the bad news. I was currently in Singapore, sourcing fabrics for my new summer line and my flight had been cancelled. I had been away for two weeks and all I wanted to do was get home and be held in Shawn's arms.

"Hey its me …… Yeah I know that I am meant to be on a plane already, but there have been problems and my flight was cancelled. I wont be able to get out for another day or so …… I miss you too, I will call you when the new flights are confirmed. Talk to you soon"

I guess you would like a small account of the history that led me to this point, I will try to sum it up so as not to bore you too much. I started my life as any normal girl, quite ordinary, not popular in school, a small group of close friends who I have kept for years and have had the wonderful pleasure of being picked on at times. I would not say that I was a top designer, but I would like to think I was on my way. I had developed a label and started my own store that was doing surprisingly well although was not making me rich by any counts. I met Shawn in my second year of design school, about 3 years ago when I was 17. He was 19, blonde with light blue eyes and finishing up a management degree. We met in the department store I was working in to pay for my tuition, when he was looking for a birthday gift for his mother. Now I am not going to lie to you and tell you I am beautiful and the most stunning beauty to walk to earth, although some of my friends seem to agree with that statement on my behalf, but I am reasonably pretty with long golden blonde hair that has natural silvery highlights and blue eyes that I guess would match the clear sky on a summers day, and others say I am short, but I prefer the term petite. So after helping the cute guy find a gift we ended up talking for quite some time and he asked me out. Things I guess spiralled from there and earlier this year he proposed, it was nothing spectacular, just a simple "lets get married" uttered on Valentines day, but it was enough for me. I guess after living together for a year I was just excited that he wanted more of a commitment.

So I guess that brings us back to the present one moth after our engagement. And out of the daydreams of the past there is annoying ringing bugging me. I look around trying to work out where the sound is coming from when I realise it is the phone under my hand. What can I say, I am blonde and sometimes I act it.

"Hello, …. Yes this is Serenity Taylor ……. Oh that is fantastic. Thank you so much, I really appreciate it." The airline just called to advise me that they had managed to sort out another flight for me, so I scurried around to grab my things and head for the airport thinking that I would just surprise Shawn.

'Ah finally home' I thought as I breathed in deeply of the familiar Tokyo air as I made my way over to a taxi. The excitement bubbling up inside me was almost too much as we approached our apartment and I had to refrain myself to keep still and not bounce all over the back of the car. I thanked the driver as I paid him and took my bags inside. It is times like this when I have three heavy bags that I am glad that we have an apartment building with a porter. I left the bags down at the reception area knowing that they would be brought up to my rooms shortly and bounced over to the lifts grinning and waving greetings to all the staff I saw on the way. The lift ride taking forever I took the time to ponder over why the lift always takes so much longer when you cant wait to get somewhere. Suddenly disrupted out I my musings the door opened on the 6th floor and I raced down the hall to my home. I was a little surprised to hear music playing and guessed that Shawn must have left it on when he went to work, as he shouldn't be home for a few hours and I planned to have a special surprise waiting for him when he got home. I made my way to the bedroom, planning to lay down and rest until my bags came up, when I heard strange noises from behind the closed door, almost like moaning. Thinking that maybe Shawn was sick and in pain I pushed the door open quickly asking if he was ok only to have my words catch in my throat and my mouth drop open at the sight in front of me.

On my bed I saw my fiancée naked wrestling with his secretary or maybe I should call her his sex-retary. They didn't seem to hear me, and the red haired bimbo was moaning so loud it was no wonder. I would put I stop to this I thought, as I prepared to slam the door and scream at them to know what was going on. I suddenly wondered how often this was happening? Had it happened every trip I went on? Did it happen at work? And what about all the late nights he had been working lately? With those thoughts screaming through my head and not wanting to know the answers, I ran past the bed to the closet and started grabbing things and stuffing them a bag trying to block out what was happening behind me. When I was done I slammed the closet door and screamed "How could you do this to me?" and ran out of the apartment.

While I stood waiting for the lift Shawn came running out wrapped in a sheet trying to tell me that it was not what it looked like. I scoffed, like I could believe that.

"So you are trying to tell me that you were not having sex with your secretary?" I said angrily.

"You weren't supposed to come back yet" was the only response he offered me. I stood in shock, I just could not believe that was all me could say to me, did our life together mean nothing to him. I left him with the parting words "Well that just shows how much you care about me then doesn't it."

I managed to keep the tears at bay as I went down in the lift took my bags bag from reception and hailed a cab, but could not hold them back any longer as I pulled out my cell phone to call my friend Raye to ask her if it was ok if I stayed a couple of nights. When I arrived at Raye's she helped me get settled before the questioning began. She knew me very well being that she was my best friend and very beautiful at that. With her long raven hair and amethyst eyes that flashed sparks whenever she was angry or excited. We had known each other since kindergarten and had been best friends since, telling each other all our secrets, we knew when there was something upsetting the other and Raye knew that this was one of those times. Just like I knew that she was secretly still in love with the handsome young man that helped her at her grandfathers temple, and was scared to let him know due to pain she had felt in the past from a boy she had thought she had loved back when we were sixteen, but he was doing nothing but using her. I really would have to try and get Raye and Chad together when I had sorted through all this, as they were both as scared as each other of rejection, but so in love with each other it was ridiculous. Raye managed to pull the whole painful story out of me, and as I repeated every word of the encounter it ripped at my heart, tearing the battered organ to shreds as it sank in how betrayed I had been. As I shook with heart wrenching sobs Raye held me and rocked me telling me that everything was going to be ok and that we would work it out.


	2. Chapter 2

AN:For those of you who are reading my story, I am sorry it took me so long to post another chapter. I do have more written, although it is not finished, but at the moment I am not entirely happy with some of it so doing a bit of reworking. I will try and get more posted soon if you are interested. I am always open to constructive comments.

Happy reading

Sky

Disclaimer : I don't own Sailor Moon or any of its characters otherwise I wouldn't need to write as I would be drooling over Endy.

The next morning I woke late, drained by the events of yesterday and decided that needed to get somewhere far away for a while and after a few minutes of lying defeated in bed thinking the perfect place jumped into my head, and I picked up the phone.

"Hi its me, Serena. …… Yeah I know I'm sorry to call you so late …. Yes I do realise what time it is over there, but I really need to ask you a big favour. …. I really need to get away for a week and I was hoping I could come and stay with you? …. No I haven't booked it yet …..You don't have to, I can do that ….. Ok then. Thank you so much Darien. I will see you then"

I had done it. My ticket was being booked at this moment and I was going to be on my way to Athens by the end of the day to stay with a very close friend of mine Darien Shields.

Darien was a very rich and successful architect, who had lived in Tokyo and went to our school for a while years back when his parents, who owned a lucrative shipping line, were sending him all over the world to go to school. I thought he was the most beautiful man I had ever laid eyes on when I saw him walking through the front doors of the school that first fateful day back when I was 14, he was 17 and just finishing the high school year with our school before moving on to university in a few short months. He was taller then me, which I guess given my height was not that much of a problem, but he really was tall, had an amazing body that looked like it had been stolen from Adonis and hair the colour of midnight that whenever you saw it you wanted to run your hands through it. But the most beautiful feature about him was his eyes, a stormy ocean blue that seem to be fathomless, if you looked far enough you were sure you could see his soul, although only for a few as he mostly kept up a shield to try and protect himself.

I can't remember exactly how it happened but we had quickly become friends and before long he had asked me out. I was totally smitten and had no idea how rich and powerful his family was, I had just loved him and all that he was, and enjoyed all the time that we had spent together. We had been inseparable spending every free minute we had with each other and our friends, until 18 months later his parents decided to rip my heart out. They made him come home to Athens, half the continent of Europe away from me. I was devastated, and so was he. We really loved each other and had tried to make it work, both of us flying back and forth to see one another but in the end it had been to hard and as much as it had pained us both we had broken up, with the hope in our hearts that if we were meant to be together things would work themselves out.

After getting off the phone and collecting up all my things I had informed Raye of my plan and thanked her for her support last night. I really did love that girl like my very own sister, she understood my decision to get away and thought that it was a great idea, and made me promise to call her as soon as I got back before getting Chad to drive me to the airport. While we drove along making pleasant conversation, I was thinking in my head that I should take advantage of Raye not being around and talk to Chad about Raye to make sure they did not miss out on the love that the both deserved. So randomly into the conversation about the weather I voiced my thoughts "You know that she loves you don't you?" Chad spluttered on what he was saying and looked at me like I was crazy. "What are you talking about?" he answered.

"Who do you think I am talking about? And I know that you love her too." He was trying to get his voice to work again as his mouth kept moving trying to form words, but his shock was evident. "I know that you both have concerns about things that have happened in the past but you both deserve to be happy and you will be if you just get together." I stopped talking then as we had arrived at the airport and even though I said I would be fine he insisted that Raye would kill him if he didn't make sure that I at least got to customs ok. So we checked me in thank goodness for electronic tickets as it had made it that much easier for Darien to organise the ticket for me at short notice and made our way up to customs. As I hugged Chad goodbye before heading through I whispered to him "At least think about it ok. And I mean it she really does love you so there really is no reason to be scared. Be good and I will see you in a couple of weeks" trying my best to sound cheerful, even with the hurt I felt inside. I was hoping that even if I wasn't happy or lucky in love that at least I might be able to help others be.

Almost 16 hours later after a brief stop in Paris I finally arrived in Athens at almost 11pm absolutely exhausted, all I could think was thank goodness I had been in business class, as I don't think I could have stood economy for that long today. I stepped out of the terminal with my bag as I had only brought one with me leaving the others back at Raye's and took a lungful of fresh air as I looked around for a familiar mop of black hair, I was surprised not to see the familiar face I was expecting. Forcing myself not to panic I looked around again and saw the name Taylor on a sign held by a uniformed man. I made my way towards him and he rushed to take my bag and lead me over to a black limousine. Just as I was about to ask where Darien was he opened the door to the limo and a hand snaked out and pulled me inside. I tensed and was getting myself ready to scream when I was pulled into a hug and greeted with the words "I missed you Sere. Are you ok?" I pulled back and ended up drowning in the familiar eyes that were full of concern. I burrowed back in to the warm embrace and answered with "I've missed you too. Can we talk about it later?" Feeling him nodding his consent against the top of my head I sat back in my seat as the car drove away from the airport heading for his home. Now I could vaguely remember his parent's home from when I had visited in the past and I remember thinking that it was a very imposing mansion, and that I could never feel comfortable living there. I was scared as we pulled up to the gates of Darien's home that he would have the same kind of house, a place I wouldn't really be able to relax, but as he encouraged me to put my head up through the roof to see his house for the first time I was in awe. The structure was a large two-storied building that seemed to be a mix of Greek, Italian and Spanish design, and somehow felt like home. When Darien had first decided to go into architecture we had discussed the kind of things we would have in our homes had we been given the choice, my ideas were based on dreams of what could never be, but it seemed that Darien's were part of what would some day be his reality. The strange thing was there were things that I had seen in the small amount of the building I had seen that reminded me more of myself, then ideas that he would have had, almost as if he had built his house with both of us in mind. As he showed me up to my room and suggested that I went to bed I asked him how he had managed to afford a house like this his answer was a soft, warm smile at me followed by "I got lucky in life. Goodnight you. I will see you in the morning" before closing the door behind me.

I awoke the next morning to the sun shining brightly through my window and birds singing outside my window, I felt like I had slept a million years but when I looked at the clock it was only 8am, then I realised it would have been 2pm at home. I stepped out onto the balcony connected to my room and heard splashing down below, I looked around at the spectacular view and the extensive gardens on the property that extended towards the sea before looking down to see Darien swimming lengths. I watched him for a while before he must have felt he was being watched and stopped and looked straight up at me. "Good morning. I thought you would have slept a lot later?" he said grinning.

I smiled lazily "It's two in the afternoon at home." And answered by way of a response.

"Did you want to come join me?" at the shake of my head he continued "Ok then you get dressed and I will meet you inside for breakfast in about 20 minutes."

Apparently Darien had taken the day off work as we lazed around the house after we finished breakfast that morning, before he dragged me out shopping to cheer me up. During the car ride back to the house it slipped out why I was so upset and had to get away from home and once again I found tears rolling uncontrollably down my cheeks. He comforted me as best he could and I did feel a bit better for it, although it didn't tell him that I didn't think that I wanted to marry Shawn anymore, I think he was able to guess. He took me out for dinner to a fancy restaurant with a name that I could not pronounce so I would have the opportunity to wear the stunning dress he had bought me that day. I much prefer my own designs but the fabric of this dress was so spectacular I could not resist it even in its simplicity. The dress was a strapless blue number that seemed to sparkle like the stars and the colour reminded me of Darien's eyes. The dress was form fitting to the hips and then faired into a slight a line shape with a fishtail train at the back. We had a wonderful time eating, drinking and laughing and it made me forget all my problems as we sat there well in to the night in between trips to the dance floor.

My biggest problem now was that I was starting to fall in love with my best friend all over again, although I knew that I shouldn't and that he only felt friendship towards me.


End file.
